


AU snippets (Synergy)

by AirgiodSLV



Category: Criminal Minds, Inception (2010)
Genre: M/M, Multi
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-07-30
Updated: 2011-07-30
Packaged: 2017-10-21 23:37:38
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 4,284
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/231143
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AirgiodSLV/pseuds/AirgiodSLV
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Eames has his own reasons for leading Reid into his bedroom. Reid hasn’t asked what those are and probably doesn’t know, but Arthur would. Arthur will, when he finds out about this.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Anniversary ficlet

**Author's Note:**

  * Inspired by [Synergy](https://archiveofourown.org/works/209885) by [AirgiodSLV](https://archiveofourown.org/users/AirgiodSLV/pseuds/AirgiodSLV). 



> A series of increasingly lengthy ficlets exploring what might conceivably happen sometime after [Synergy](http://archiveofourown.org/works/209885). Any or all can be considered purely AU.

Arthur opens his eyes. His surroundings haven’t changed since the last time he was awake and lucid, but there’s a familiar bag slung over the visitor’s chair, and a peacoat hung on the hook inside the door. The slow, reassuring beep of the heart monitor lulls him back to sleep.

The next time he opens his eyes, Spencer is slipping back into the room, a Styrofoam cup of coffee in one hand and a book in the other, awkwardly cradled against his chest and the sling supporting his shoulder. Arthur had heard about the shooting as soon as it had happened, but he hadn’t seen the evidence yet.

“Hey,” Spencer says softly when he sees Arthur. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

“You didn’t,” Arthur says, because he’d been in and out anyway. His voice is gravelly, worn from disuse. He stretches experimentally, just enough to know how much damage has been done and how far he can safely push, if it comes down to that, before he does any more. It’s not the worst shape he’s ever been in; the bullet went into his arm, so while there’s muscle damage, it’s not in a difficult-to-rest location like his shoulder or hip. Spencer will be in recovery longer than he will.

“How are you feeling?” Spencer asks, sitting on the side of the bed by Arthur’s head. He discards the book onto the bedside table but keeps the coffee, tantalizingly aromatic but still out of Arthur’s reach. Right now he doesn’t have the energy to fight for it.

Arthur has several responses to that, but none of them are entirely appropriate. He shrugs the shoulder of his good arm and says, “I’ll live.”

“They didn’t tell us what happened,” Spencer says. “Just the notification that you were here.”

“Criminals,” Arthur says. “With guns.”

Spencer’s hair is shorter than it had been the last time Arthur’d been home, tufted into soft spikes. It makes him look younger, but more confident, like he doesn’t need anything to hide behind anymore. Arthur reaches out to touch it, the pain meds doing shit for his impulse control. Spencer ducks his head to let Arthur run his hand through the soft strands, closing his eyes briefly before straightening up again.

“It’s almost time for your pills,” he tells Arthur. “Do you want anything to eat?”

Arthur shakes his head. “Did you take yours?” he asks in turn. Spencer scowls a little at him, but it’s not a guilty expression, so Arthur can relax, giving in to the haze of medication urging him not to care about anything right now.

“I haven’t had a seizure in months,” Spencer reminds him.

“That’s because you take your pills,” Arthur replies. He changes the subject, though, letting it go before Spencer can get honestly annoyed. “Hey,” he says, looking up with a tired smile. “I told you I’d be back before the end of the month.”

Spencer’s expression softens immediately, although it comes along with a half-eyeroll, a look Arthur has demonstrated more than enough to know where Spencer picked it up from. “I would have waited another week if it meant having you without the cast and the bullet hole.”

“Sorry,” Arthur murmurs, automatically flexing against the heavy weight of plaster sheathing his arm. “No deal.”

Spencer is close and warm, smelling of detergent and coffee. Arthur breathes him in and lets his eyes drift closed, ceding victory to the exhaustion weighing heavily on his eyelids.

He opens them again a second later, coming alert with the click of the door opening.

Eames pokes his head in, sweeping the room automatically before entering. “Reid,” he says by way of greeting, and then catches sight of the sling supporting Spencer’s arm. “What the hell happened to you?”

“Criminals,” Spencer says. “With guns.”

Arthur smiles faintly, closing his eyes again now that both Spencer and Eames are here to stand guard over him. He feels Spencer’s hand pass close to his face, an almost-caress.

“I wasn’t sure it would be safe for you to come here,” Eames says, the location of his voice traveling toward the empty chair in the corner as he speaks.

Arthur opens his eyes, because he’d thought the same thing, right after he’d been shot, but he’d forgotten about it in the comfort of Spencer’s presence.

“Morgan made a file,” Spencer explains. “Arthur is now a BAU suspect. If anyone asks, I’m here questioning him.”

Arthur groans softly. “Morgan did?”

“Hotch helped,” Spencer says. “JJ made it official. Garcia rushed it through the system.”

“Morgan made the file,” Arthur repeats.

“He says you can owe him one,” Spencer tells him helpfully. Eames chuckles from across the room. Arthur throws him a dark look, only partially inhibited by the fuzzy feeling of the meds in his system. The hot throb of pain is cutting through the fog with increasing insistence. Spencer is right; it’s probably almost time for another dose.

“What are you doing here?” he asks Eames, while he’s coherent enough for questions.

“Thought I’d give you a lift,” Eames answers easily. “The hospital has cleared you for discharge.”

“You don’t have a license,” Spencer points out.

Eames raises his eyebrows. “Really? That’s not what it says on the plastic card I keep in my wallet for just these occasions.”

“Henry McNally from Nebraska is not driving me home,” Arthur says, although Eames is an excellent driver in any country. He’s not as good as Arthur is, but then few people are. Few people, as well, have reason to be experienced in 100mph car chases down the wrong side of freeways, and hairpin turns in back alleys not meant for motor vehicles.

“Is that even legal? Do I have an obligation to confiscate it?” Spencer asks, curious.

“The day you’re assigned to driver’s license fraud, I’m going to shoot your bosses,” Arthur tells him with sincerity, and it’s only half the pain meds talking.

“I don’t think you have to worry about it,” Spencer says gently. “And I can drive you home. I came with Emily; she’ll let me take the SUV.”

“You don’t have a license either,” Arthur feels obligated to remind him.

“I have a permit,” Spencer replies. “You can supervise me while you sleep.”

Arthur makes a noise stating his feelings on that subject.

“Well, you’re certainly in no condition to drive,” Eames tells him, amused. “I’ll go get someone to start the paperwork, we can sort it out later.”

Once Eames is gone, Arthur turns his head, pressing his face against the warm corduroy of Spencer’s pants. “I need a shower,” he mumbles, when Spencer’s hand lights gently on his hair, stroking over the greasy strands.

“I’ll make sure we get a bag for your cast.” Spencer doesn’t stroke him again, just leaves his hand over Arthur’s skull, warm and solid. “This is going to make aquatic sex more of a challenge.”

“I’ll blow you over the side of the bathtub,” Arthur mumbles.

“Maybe after you sleep some more,” Spencer suggests, which sounds like a great idea to Arthur.

“Don’t let Eames write on my cast,” he orders, already slipping away into the cloudy gray shroud of sleep.

He feels Spencer’s fingers brush over his eyelids, smelling like safety and home, and then nothing but peace.


	2. Potential threesome ficlet

Arthur wakes up with the immediate knowledge that a) he’s on the couch in his apartment in D.C., and b) someone else is in here with him.

His right hand slides stealthily toward the gap in the cushions at his back, where he keeps his Glock in the event of just this sort of circumstance, but he doesn’t make it halfway there before he recognizes the cadence of the footfalls. There’s a break in the rhythm as they pass from the kitchen into the living room, presumably because Arthur’s been spotted and Spencer doesn’t want to startle him. They’re both still careful with each other in a lot of ways.

Arthur opens his eyes to let Spencer know he’s awake.

“Hello,” Spencer says, setting down his bag on the nearest chair and coming closer to the couch.

“Hey,” Arthur returns, finishing their customary greeting. He pushes himself up to a sitting position, rubbing grit out of his eyes. “You’re home early.”

“It’s past nine,” Spencer tells him, sitting on the far arm of the couch, comfortably close without pushing himself into Arthur’s personal space when he’s just woken up. “You fell asleep.”

Arthur glances at the window and confirms that it’s dark outside, the only lights artificial and dim. He’d only meant to nap for an hour or so after getting in from Baku, but apparently the jet lag had hit him harder than he’d expected. He runs his tongue along the back of his teeth experimentally. At least the taste isn’t too bad, for having been asleep so long.

“How was Azerbaijan?” Spencer asks.

“Warm,” Arthur answers, running a hand through his mussed hair. “Have you eaten?”

“I had a rice krispie treat on the way home,” Spencer answers, which is typical and makes Arthur smile slightly regardless. “Are you hungry?”

Arthur considers. “Give me another twenty minutes,” he determines. His brain might not think it’s time for dinner, but eventually his body will realize it’s running on empty and demand food.

“Preferences?”

“Anything but plov,” Arthur decides. He pauses after he says it, waiting automatically for Spencer to fill in the silence with facts on Alexander the Great, the introduction of similar rice dishes into other national cuisines, and tenth-century Persian scholar Abu Ali Ibn Sina, but it doesn’t come.

“We could order in Chinese,” Spencer suggests instead, and when Arthur nods agreement, he gets up and rummages through the drawer of utensils and take-out menus until he finds their favorite dim sum restaurant. “Do you want anything specific? The barbecued pork?”

“Whatever you want is fine,” Arthur tells him, because he’s not hungry yet, but by the time the food arrives he’ll most likely be famished and willing to eat everything on offer. Spencer knows what he likes.

Spencer dials the restaurant and starts ordering with his usual disorganized enthusiasm, and Arthur finds himself looking at the chopsticks on the counter. Spencer must have pulled them out while he was retrieving the menu. Two sets.

“They said fifteen minutes,” Spencer says, reclaiming his attention. He wanders through the kitchen, pouring a glass of water and fiddling with the coffee maker. Everything looks right, familiar. Arthur has watched Spencer do all of it a hundred times.

“Morgan said he might take me to play basketball on Saturday morning, if we’re not working,” Spencer tells him, leaving the coffee maker for now and wandering back to the couch. “JJ and Emily were debating whether my height might make up for my complete lack of athletic prowess.”

“Nothing can make up for that,” Arthur responds automatically, winning a smile in response. And he knows better, but he can’t help himself. “Morgan?”

“There are far more homoerotic sports he could have chosen if he had any ulterior motive,” Spencer points out. “Wrestling. Self-defense. Firearms training.”

“Fire…” Arthur stops when he sees the grin Spencer is failing to hide. “Funny,” he says. “Tell Morgan that if you ever need private firearms training, I’ve got it covered.”

“I don’t think it’s even up for debate,” Spencer says. Which is…a strange thing to say, actually, since Hotchner still walks Spencer through the practice sessions leading up to his re-certifications. Arthur had offered to step in, a few years ago, but they’d both agreed it was best if the two of them kept their distance anywhere they could be spotted by another undercover operative. Such as, say, a firing range full of FBI agents.

“Not after last time,” Arthur agrees, testing. There’s something off here, something he can’t put his finger on.

He’s not dreaming. He remembers how he got here, every step of the way. The extraction in Baku, cab ride to his hotel, six hours of laying low before his flight and keeping the twitchy extractor from blowing their cover, picking up his car from Dulles and driving home, falling asleep on the couch waiting for Spencer to come home…

Falling asleep on the couch.

Arthur relaxes back against the arm of the couch, putting himself at a better angle to keep an eye on the room, and incidentally within easy reach of his Glock. Spencer seems to take that as an invitation, settling on the cushions next to Arthur’s legs and angling in towards Arthur the way he has dozens of times before.

He’s not in any immediate danger. If this is a projection, then it’s Arthur’s projection, and it won’t do him any harm.

If it isn’t a projection, then Arthur has a good idea of what this is.

Spencer has the bright-eyed look that means he’s aware he has Arthur spread out on a couch with no pressing commitments in their immediate future. Normally, Arthur loves that look.

He plays into it regardless, tipping his chin up slightly and spreading his legs so that Spencer can shift between them. There might be quicker ways to find out if he’s dreaming and Spencer is a projection, but this is the most subtle one he can think of at the moment.

“I missed you,” he says, when Spencer takes the invitation and moves closer, making glancing contact between their bodies without settling.

“I missed you too,” Spencer says, with the note of subdued longing in his voice that cuts into Arthur’s chest a little every time he comes home after a long job. “How long can you stay?”

“A few days,” Arthur answers, relaxing back into the cushions as Spencer gradually rests his weight on Arthur’s hips and chest. He needs to be in Warsaw by Thursday at the latest, even if he delays his planned departure.

Spencer’s breath is warm on his face, lips grazing his jaw and the stubble on his throat, their mouths doing a slow, familiar dance towards consummation. Arthur tilts his head, lips parted, but Spencer nuzzles his cheek and mouths the soft lobe of his ear, drawing out the tension.

It’s not usually like this. It’s not infrequently like this, to be fair, but what’s strange is for this to happen now, when Arthur is just back after two weeks in Azerbaijan and another three before that in Ashgabat. After a long separation there’s generally more slamming each other against walls and racing each other to get their clothes off, and blowjobs that don’t last because they’re both too wound up to hold on.

It’s not this, not Spencer sprawled in his lap without grinding down, not their arms tangling and unwinding as they barely touch each other, fingers grazing clothing and not delving yet towards skin. Spencer seems hesitant in a way he rarely is in bed, holding back. It’s not quite right.

Then again, Spencer is a profiler, and he had to have noticed the second Arthur turned wary. Arthur knows he gets paranoid after jobs, always double-checking his reality and second-guessing behavior if it seems the slightest bit out of the ordinary. With Arthur on guard, it’s not really a surprise Spencer is jittery, which is throwing his behavior off even more as a direct result of Arthur’s suspicion. They’re caught in a loop.

Arthur does the only thing he can and closes the circuit.

Spencer’s mouth opens over his the second they meet, their tongues flickering greetings before curling and winding together between their mouths, a push-pull contest that neither of them ever win or concede. Arthur deepens the kiss and Spencer moans softly, his fingers picking at Arthur’s shirt, trying to find their way under the hem.

It feels real. It even tastes like Spencer, marshmallow-sticky with the lingering reminder of entire pots of coffee consumed since he last brushed his teeth. Arthur’s body responds to the touch of Spencer’s hands on his skin the way he always does, without sensing the slightest difference. There’s no way to be sure.

Spencer moans again and his fingers drift up to tangle in Arthur’s hair.

He’s sure enough.

Arthur catches Spencer’s wrist in his hand and says, “Eames.”

“What –?” There’s not a flicker of anything in Spencer’s expression besides confusion. He starts to sit back, but Arthur tightens his grip, squeezing the delicate bones in Spencer’s wrist harder. Spencer tries to pull his hand away, but Arthur is ready for resistance and hooks a leg around Spencer’s, flipping them over so that their positions are reversed, Arthur with one knee between Spencer’s thighs and Spencer pinned with his head against the arm of the couch.

There’s a split-second of muscle tension when he does it, and that’s all Arthur needs.

Eames is too good to slip up and react when he’s in character, but Arthur had already called him out, set off the alarm bells. Eames knows that Arthur can and will use violence in a dream if he feels it’s necessary, and Eames has had self-defense maneuvers drilled into his marrow just as thoroughly as Arthur has. Caught between a forge and self-preservation, he has to fight himself to let Arthur take him down, and Arthur feels it.

“Eames,” he says again, and this time he nudges the barrel of his Glock into Spencer’s stomach.

There’s more than a flicker this time; Eames is letting him see what he’s thinking. There’s the barest hint of sly innocence – Eames determining whether he can still get away with keeping his cover – followed by the recognition that Arthur isn’t just guessing. He _knows._

Arthur presses the gun harder into Eames’ stomach, letting him think long and hard about pushing this. A gut shot isn’t a quick way to die.

“What gave me away?” Eames asks, good-humored, snapping back into his own skin like pages turning in a flip-book. He seems entirely unbothered by the fact that he’s been discovered. He probably expected it all along. They’re both too good at what they do to go up against each other.

“Everything,” Arthur lies, sitting back on his heel without removing his knee from its strategic position next to Eames’ groin. He lets the gun rest on his thigh, available without being immediately threatening, and looks Eames over. “You were the one who told me you should never forge a lover when things could get intimate.”

“True. There are too many things that can’t be accounted for, especially in a relationship that’s lasted as long as yours has. But that’s why I gave us a time limit of fifteen minutes,” Eames reminds him, one finger pointing back in the general direction of the kitchen and the take-out menu. “And you weren’t feeling frisky until a moment ago. It seemed safe enough.”

Arthur snorts. Eames doesn’t need to know – and will never know, if Arthur has anything to say about it – how fast he and Spencer have taken each other apart during one of these reunions. Fifteen minutes is enough time to get dressed to answer the door again afterwards.

“What are you doing here?” Arthur asks. The last he’d heard, Eames had been flying to Boston from somewhere in Central America.

“Layover. My flight was cancelled due to thunderstorms in Massachusetts, and Dr. Reid was kind enough to offer me a place to stay when I called. He let me in this morning before he left for work.”

Arthur closes his eyes. He almost can’t believe how stupid he was. He didn’t even check the bedrooms after he got home from Dulles, just ascertained that Spencer wasn’t there and passed out fully-dressed in the living room. If it had been someone other than Eames, Arthur might well be dead right now.

He opens his eyes again to catch Eames studying him with frank interest. “So you thought you’d break into my thoughts and molest me,” he hazards, to steer Eames away from his evaluation.

“Can’t blame me for trying,” Eames says easily. Arthur can, in fact, but…he really can’t. Falling asleep the way he had was practically giving Eames permission to hook him up and root around in his head. Arthur can be hacked off about how he chose to do it, but not that he did.

Music seeps through the walls, clear and drawn-out. The warning for the kick.

Arthur looks back at Eames. “You didn’t actually believe I’d fall for it.”

Eames raises his eyebrows. “Didn’t I? It was going awfully well there, for a while.”

Arthur shakes his head. “If you'd thought you could get away with it, you would have set the timer for longer.”

Eames shrugs one shoulder against the padded couch. “True. But this was interesting in a different way than I’d imagined.”

Arthur tenses up, catches himself, and forces his muscles to relax. He can’t afford to give anything away around Eames, and definitely nothing so obvious.

Eames props himself up on his elbows, which puts them in each other’s personal space again, almost as close as they were before. Arthur fights himself to keep from retreating, because Eames is playing games with him, and Arthur isn’t about to allow him the satisfaction.

Eames’ breath is warm and smells of spearmint instead of marshmallows and coffee. “You knew before you kissed me.”

“I suspected,” Arthur corrects. “I wasn’t sure. It could have been a projection.”

“Interesting way to test your theory,” Eames says. When Arthur starts to pull back and stand up, Eames leans forward, stalling the movement and trapping Arthur against Eames’ suddenly bent knee. “Tell me something,” Eames says, low and secret. “If it were Reid down here, and me wearing your skin, would he have kissed me?”

“Fuck off,” Arthur says sharply. He’s through with playing. The game is over.

“What if it were you wearing my skin, and he knew it?” Eames asks, shrewd and too-observant. “Would he kiss you then?”

Arthur wakes up.

He takes a deep breath, inhaling through his nose and exhaling again before he opens his eyes and sits up. It’s still light outside, the clock sitting at half-past four. Spencer won’t be back for hours yet.

Eames stirs beside him, on the floor. One of the pillows from Arthur’s bedroom is under his head, with the PASIV set between them. He looks at Arthur with the question still in his eyes, and Arthur bites his tongue on what he knows is the answer.

“I’m going to take a shower,” he tells Eames. “Try not to break in while I’m in there, or I will shoot you this time.”

It’s easier than saying _yes._


	3. Originally entitled "This is a thing that may have happened."

They hadn’t planned it.

They hadn’t planned it and it probably shouldn’t have happened, but Eames kept a place in the Cayman Islands and Reid had taken him up on the invitation to stay for a few days after their case finished in Miami (“Lovely view, perfect weather, you should swing ‘round and take a holiday”), and they’d both been drunk on cachaça on the balcony of Eames’ beach house, talking about politics and kitchen appliances and books while they and everything around them were painted and shadowed by the sunset.

Reid had taken his phone out seven times during the conversation, during those peaceable lulls that always happen in relaxed company, but he’d never dialed to make a call, and it had never rung. Eames knew enough about Arthur’s whereabouts – Arthur’d had three weeks in between jobs last month and he wasn’t working now, and both times he’d gone to France instead of back to D.C. – to guess at the reasons why.

Eames had half-expected the overture even though Reid had given him no hint of flirtation before then; until now, until the hand on his arm that rests just slightly heavier than necessary and lingers, waiting for him to accept or reject.

He accepts.

Reid isn’t as awkward in bed as Eames had expected. He’s breathy and they both get loud toward the end, rutting against warm skin and grasping at each other, and if Reid keeps his eyes closed, Eames doesn’t say anything about it. He knows what this is.

He’d gotten the barest explanation from Reid earlier, when he’d inquired about Arthur’s whereabouts – “We’re not living together right now. I think he’s in Africa, working.” – but this isn’t a declaration of independence or a celebration of newfound freedom. It’s not even purely revenge, or at least Reid isn’t consciously thinking of it as such.

It’s loneliness, and unhappiness, and attraction mixed with alcohol and served too-warm in the sticky Caribbean humidity. Reid doesn’t lead him on with any false pretences, just takes his clothes off and lets Eames put his mouth on the pulse of his throat, on his nipple, his skin damp with sweat.

They’ll fuck again in the morning, after a shower and the first cup of coffee, which will eliminate any chance of writing it off as a drunken mistake. Eames already knows it isn’t, regardless. Few people would accuse Reid of acting before he thinks, and Eames has never been so drunk that he isn’t aware of what he’s doing. He’s a conscious accomplice.

He learns the lines of Reid’s bones and the salty taste of him, the sharp angles of his joints and how he bends and yields to Eames' greater weight, and the way he bites down on his tongue when he comes. That, Eames thinks, is probably new. He doesn’t take offense.

Eames has his own reasons for leading Reid into his bedroom. Reid hasn’t asked what those are and probably doesn’t know, but Arthur would. Arthur will, when he finds out about this.

And Eames doesn’t have any expectation that he won’t.


End file.
